Family Olympic Viewing Game – Go for the Gold

I love watching both the summer and winter Olympics, but the winter ones are by far my favorite. I kid you not that our television will hardly be turned off once the games begin. As much fun as it is to watch the games though, it’s even more fun when you get involved with the teams.

I saw this back during the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City. I was doing a tutor class where I would work 2 hours of every school day in a 4th grade classroom in my school district. That year was the year that the U.S. started really making their mark in the Winter Games. Every day I’d go into the class and update on the board how many medals we had won by that point. The kids went crazy watching the numbers go up, and they were so excited to come in every day and talk about the games.

This family Olympic viewing game is sort of a spin on what I watched happen with my 4th graders years ago. Only this time every family member is going to have their own teams to cheer for.

I do like to give credit where credit is due, so I have to say that I did not come up with this game on my own. For years a friend of mine has done this with her group of friends, and they have the best time. I have created all the printables though so that you can enjoy this game with your family.

What is Go for the Gold?

This is a game that you can play while watching the Olympic games. The country cards are current for the 2018 Winter Olympics, but you will be able to make them work for other Olympic games (although my goal is to always update them).

Everyone playing will draw cards with the names of countries playing in the Winter Games. Each player is going to cheer for the countries that they drew. Every time one of those countries wins a medal the player earns a certain number of points. The number of points is dependent on the medal won. The person at the end of the Olympics with the most points is the winner!

How Many People can Play?

Go for the Gold is meant to be played with at least 2 people, but you can go way higher than that. You can really have as many people playing as there are countries competing in the games. This game can be a family activity, or you can get together with a group of friends to play. You don’t need to be together for all of the games to play, but it will be a lot more fun that way.

How to Play the Family Olympic Viewing Game – Go for the Gold

2. Cut out all of the country name cards, fold them in half, and place them into a container or basket. You’ll notice that 10 of the cards have red letters. These represent the 10 winningest countries for the Winter Games. You can either cut these out, fold them, and put them in a separate container, or you can set them aside completely.

3. Print out the Go for the Gold playing cards. Each card has room to record stats for up to four players. If you have more than four people playing then you’ll need to print off more than one card.

4. Have all of the players draw countries from the container(s). I suggest having each person draw three different countries. There are two ways you can do this. You can either draw all of the countries you play with from the main container (not using any of the red lettered cards), or you can have every person draw one big winning country (a red lettered card) and then two countries from the main container. Either way I suggest removing your own country from the drawing because you’re going to be cheering them on any way.

5. Write everyone’s name in a square under “Players” on the playing card and also write in the countries that they are going to be cheering for.

6. Watch the Olympics and cheer on the countries you drew. If one of those countries wins a medal than give yourself a tally mark in your row in the correct medal column.

7. When the games are all over, add up your points. You get 3 points for every gold medal, 2 points for every silver, and 1 point for every bronze. The player with the most points is the winner!

I hope your family really enjoys playing this family Olympic viewing game. Watching the Olympics is always a lot of fun, but it’s even more fun when you’re playing this game a long with them.

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This is such a cute idea! We love watching the Olympics as a family, although I have to admit I’m more of a summer Olympics fan. 🙂 Thanks so much for linking up to Something Fabulous Wednesday! I’m pinning this idea! 🙂

What a great idea! This would even work well with my friends and I for our closing ceremony party… I found your blog through the blog party, looks adorable 🙂 Definitely going to check out some more of your posts!